Abram Friesen (1870-1943), Mennonite farmer, born in Berdjansk, Russia married in 1896 to Aganetha Reimer (1872-1924) born in Fernheim, Crimea. They had 9 children born to them in Ogus-Tobe, Crimea between 1897 and 1914. They were: Heinrich Friesen (1897-1919); Sara Friesen (1899-1968) married to Jacob Braun of Tiegenhagen, Molotschna, S. Russia; Helene Friesen (1902-1982) married to Abram Dueck; Peter Friesen (1903-1977) married to Eva Sudermann of Berdjansk; Renate Friesen (1906-1987) married to Peter Dueck; Gerhard Friesen (1907-1937); Mariechen Friesen (1909-2001) married to Hans Federau; Anna Friesen (1912-1997) married to Jacob Wall; and, Katherina Friesen (1914-1928). Jacob and Sara (Friesen) Braun lived in Tiegenhagen, Molotschna (S. Russia) until they immigrated to Canada in 1925 where they settled at Ste. Elizabeth, Manitoba. The rest of the Friesen family remained in the Soviet Union. Heinrich disappeared in 1919 after the Russian Revolution. Gerhard disappeared in 1937 in Siberia where he had been sent to work in the forest. With the changes during the early years of the new Soviet regime in the 1920s, Abram Friesen with some of his family was sent to Siberia in 1930, where he died in 1943. The family maintained letter contact with Jacob and Anna (Friesen) Braun in Canada from 1921 to 1938. In 1956 contact was again established between family members in the Soviet Union and the Braun family in Manitoba. Letters written mainly by Helene (Friesen) Dueck, Renate (Friesen) Dueck, Anna (Friesen) Wall and Peter Friesen were received from 1956 to 1982. Anna (Friesen) Braun died in 1968 in Manitoba. Jacob Braun visited visited many of these family members in the Soviet Union on a tour in 1971. The correspondence ceased shortly after Helene (Friesen) Dueck passed away in 1982. A few letters were exchanged after that. Anna (Friesen) Wall, the last of the siblings, died in 2001.

The Cohnstaedt family acquired a degree of prominence as German journalists during the second half of the 19th and the early 20th centuries. Ludwig Cohnstaedt (1847-1934) and his son Wilhelm Cohnstaedt (1880-1937) were senior editors of the Frankfurter Zeitung, a prominent liberal newspaper founded in 1856. When Wilhelm refused to write an editorial welcoming Hitler to power and endorsing the new Nazi regime in 1933, the Cohnstaedts, who were Jewish middle class liberals, had to leave Germany. Wilhelm moved to Paris and then to New York, where he wrote for the press and worked on a book about the collapse of the German (Weimar) republic before taking his own life in 1937. His eldest son, Hans Jacob, immigrated to England and then to Chicago. His daughter Ruth, a communist, was arrested, fled to Italy, and after returning to Nazi Germany, also took her own life. Martin (1917-2002), Wilhelm’s youngest son, was sent to England by his mother Else (nee Goebel; 1881-1974), a non-Jew who taught French, English and Italian and had an interest in organic farming and vegetarianism. Martin completed his secondary education at Leighton Park, a Quaker Secondary School in Reading, and at Woodbrooke, a Quaker Study Centre in Birmingham. He immigrated to the United States in 1937, where he was joined by his mother. Martin’s pacifism and his belief in Quaker philosophy would guide him throughout his life.

In the United States Martin studied vocational agriculture at Rutgers University in New Jersey (BSc, 1937-41), agricultural resource economics at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (MA, 1942-43), and rural sociology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison (1948-50), where he earned his PhD in1954.

In 1940, while at Rutgers Martin was nominated for membership in Alpha Zeta, a national agricultural fraternity but declined the offer because the fraternity excluded non-whites. A year later, in 1941, Martin refused to register for military service and was classified as a conscientious objector. His wartime service consisted of working as a milk tester in rural Virginia and in 1946 he participated in an UNRRA mission, shipping cows and horses from the United States to Poland. Because he had refused military service his application for American citizenship was denied after the war. Aided by the American Friends Service Committee and the American Civil Liberties Union, Martin appealed his case all the way to the American Supreme Court, where he won the right to citizenship in 1950.

Martin’s academic career and his community work took him and his family - he had married Rebecca Boone and they had two sons - to a number of American colleges and universities. In 1946-48, he taught economics and sociology at Sterling College in Kansas; from 1948 through 1952, he was a teaching assistant and lecturer at the University of Wisconsin and at Downer College in Milwaukee; in 1952-53 he was a visiting instructor at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York; in 1955-56, he was assistant professor at Wisconsin State College in Milwaukee; and from 1956 through 1966, he was an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. After Martin and Rebecca divorced in 1961, Martin increasingly combined his work as an academic with the practical application of his Quaker philosophical beliefs and social ideals. At Antioch College in Ohio, where he was a visiting associate professor of sociology in 1964-67, he became involved in the War on Poverty. He worked as an organizer with the Supporting Council of Preventative Effort (SCOPE) on the “Head Start” and the “Moving Ahead Together” (MAT) projects in Dayton, Ohio, helping local Blacks claim their rights to health care, education and food.

In 1967 Martin took up a position as Professor of Sociology at the Regina Campus of the University of Saskatchewan (after 1974, the University of Regina). In addition to his teaching and administrative duties, he participated in the organization of community self-help groups (aboriginal and low-income single mothers), researched the impact of a potash mine on the small rural community of Lanigan, Saskatchewan, and studied small arctic communities along the western shore of Hudson Bay as part of the University of Saskatchewan Institute for Northern Studies. Soon after moving to Regina Martin met and married Joy Rowe, an art teacher who shared Martin’s commitment to pacifism and community development. They adopted two children and a daughter was born in 1971. By 1969, Martin’s non-academic work as a community organizer, and his efforts to bring sociology students into the departmental decision-making process, including curriculum and the hiring of faculty, caused tension with faculty and the university administration. Although an internal university review committee (the Zacaruk Report, 1969) concluded that criticism of Martin was unjustified, the administration relieved Martin of his administrative responsibilities as acting chair of the Sociology department. In 1971 a dispute concerning Martin’s teaching methods culminated in his suspension from teaching although a second external review committee (the Woods Report, 1972) concluded that Martin had been treated unfairly. Until he was forced to take early retirement in 1978, Martin focused on community development work with non-status Indian and Métis peoples in northern Saskatchewan, including helping them organize opposition to uranium mining. In response to his forced early retirement, Martin sued the University of Regina for wrongful dismissal. When the Supreme Court of Canada finally upheld his case and awarded him more than $200,000 plus costs in 1995, Martin Cohnstaedt was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. He passed away in Toronto in November 2002.

Donald Coubrough was born in July 1934 in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba. He has been a grain farmer in Portage la Prairie his entire life and served with the Agricultural Fair Board as second Vice-President and Vice-President before serving as President from 1998 to 2000. He became a life member of the Agricultural Fair Board in 2002 when he retired. Donald's son Kevin was born on September 22, 1963. He is farming grain on the family farm in Portage la Prairie. He obtained an Agricultural Diploma from the University of Manitoba in 1983.

The Dixon family originally settled in Quebec before moving to Manitoba. Margaret Ann Purcell and George William Dixon were both born in Belfast, Ireland in 1858 and 1851, respectively. Their families immigrated to Kildar in Joliette County, Quebec. Margaret and George got married in 1872. They moved to Rounthwaite, Manitoba, where they raised a family of 13 children. Most of their descendants still live in the Brandon area. Mary Baker is the grand-daughter of George William Dixon and is married to James Victor Baker.

John Skirving Ewart was born in Toronto on August 11, 1849 and was educated at Upper Canada College and at Orgoode Hall Law School. He was called to the Ontario Bar in 1871 and to the Manitoba Bar in 1884. He practiced law in Toronto from 1871 to 1882, and in Winnipeg from 1882 to 1904. In 1904 he went into partnership in Ottawa (Ewart, Scott, Kelley & Kelley), centering practice as counsel to the Supreme Court and Privy Council. He was a constitutional expert and advocate of Canadian independence. He retired from practice in 1914 in order to write on constitutional law and politics. He died on February 21, 1933. John Skirving's son Thomas Seaton Ewart was a graduate of St. John's College in Winnipeg. He was afterwards a civil servant in the Government of Manitoba under John Bracken who was Premier from 1922 to 1943.

Joseph "Joe" E. Girling was born near Coventry, England in September 1872. He emigrated to Rapid City in the Basswood District of Manitoba in 1889, when he was 16 years of age. He was following in the footsteps of his uncle, William "Billy" Girling, who had come to Manitoba several years earlier. Joseph and his Uncle Billy rented a farm together in the early 1890s but went their separate ways when William married in 1895. Joe left the area and spent several years working for farmers and in logging camps until he purchased his own farm in 1900. He sold this farm in 1902 and bought another in the Montcalm District. In 1903, Joe married Mary Forsyth, the youngest daughter of James and Isabella Forsyth. Joe and Mary had two children: Joseph Raymond (Raymond) and Mary Kathleen (Kay). In 1915, they sold their farm and moved to the Basswood district to be nearer to the new school that was being built.

Raymond Girling was born in October 1907. He attended Basswood School for eleven years and the Manitoba Agricultural College in Winnipeg for one year. After receiving his certificate he returned to the family farm, married Margaret Lane, and worked in partnership with his father Joseph until his parents' retirement in 1943. In 1952, Raymond married Edith Mitchell (nee Kingdon). They farmed independently until 1972, and resided on the Basswood farm until 1977, when they built a new home in Minnedosa. Raymond was predeceased by Edith in 1998, and passed away in January 2004.

Wenceslaus Hallama settled in Canada in 1891 and purchased land near Grande Pointe from his uncle, Joseph Schwab, four years later. He married Barbara Blahnik from Bohemia and they had two children. Wenceslaus was the first farmer in the area to own a seed drill and a gasoline tractor. In 1938, their only son Joseph took over the farm until 1971. In 1971, his son Edward took over the farm.

On November 27, 1873 a fourth son, Thomas Glendenning Hamilton, was born to James and Isabella (Glendenning) Hamilton of Agincourt, Ontario. Agincourt, then a section of the Borough of Scarborough, is now part of Metropolitan Toronto.

In 1883, this Scottish-Canadian family moved west and homesteaded in Saskatchewan. They lived in a sod hut on the bank of the Saskatchewan River on a site which is now part of the city of Saskatoon. The Hamiltons were one of the first pioneer families to settle in Saskatoon and did much to further the community and cultural life of the tiny settlement.

In 1884, Saskatoon's first school was opened and a literary society was organized with James Hamilton serving as the society's first president. The years 1884 to 1885 also witnessed the second northwest rebellion. During the uprising the Hamiltons sheltered the wounded and otherwise assisted the Canadian troops who had been sent to stop the insurrection.

Shortly after the fighting ceased, James Hamilton died. The family was soon further saddened by the death of the only daughter, Margaret. Mrs. Hamilton and her five sons continued to farm the homestead until 1891 when the family moved to Winnipeg in order that the boys might secure a better education. The eldest son, Robert, was already working as an electrician in Winnipeg and John, the second son, had left to teach school in British Columbia when Mrs. Hamilton and her youngest son "Willie" left by train for their new home. The other two boys, James and Thomas, covered the eight hundred miles to Winnipeg by pony and buckboard and, for the last several miles, on foot.

Both James and Thomas attended Manitoba College. Upon graduating, they taught school for a period in order to raise the funds to enter medical school. Thomas graduated from medical school in 1903 and completed his internship at the Winnipeg General Hospital in 1904. He established residence and commenced practice in the district of Elmwood, where he continued to live and work throughout his career.

On November 26, 1906 he married Lillian May Forrester of Emerson, Manitoba. Miss Forrester had graduated in 1905 from the Training School for Nurses - Winnipeg General Hospital and had received the top award for "Highest General Proficiency". The Hamiltons were to have four children--Margaret, Glen, James and Arthur.

From the many accounts written by his friends and associates, as well as from his own letters, publications and lecture notes, Dr. Hamilton emerges as a calm, thorough, painstaking individual. For the next twenty-nine years he was to dedicate these admirable qualities to the service of his fellow man through his church and his profession, on civic committees, as a member of the provincial legislature and as a punctilious investigator of the metapsychic. A faithful Presbyterian, he was a loyal member of King Memorial Church Session and Congregation. In 1907 he was elected and ordained an Elder, became a trustee of the church property and later served as the chairman of its building committee.

He was elected School Trustee for Winnipeg's Ward Seven in 1906 and was re-elected by acclamation the following year. Altogether, he served on the Public School Board for nine years, one year as chairman. Some notable achievements of the Winnipeg Public School Board during his years of service were the introduction of fire drills in the public schools, free medical examinations for the students, and supervised playground activities during the summer months.

In July 1914, "TGH" (as he was frequently called) became actively involved in provincial politics. He ran as a Liberal candidate to the 14th Manitoba Legislative Assembly and was narrowly defeated by the Conservative nominee, H.D. McWhirter. Owing to maladministration and scandals involved in the construction of the Parliament Buildings, the 14th Legislature was short-lived. On the resignation of the Roblin Government on May 12, 1915, Lieutenant Governor Sir Douglas Colin Cameron called upon the Honourable Tobias Crawford Norris, Leader of the Liberal Party of Manitoba, to form a cabinet. The difficulties of governing with a minority government soon prompted Premier Norris to appeal to the electorate, a move which returned the Norris Government with a large majority of the vote. Thomas Glendenning Hamilton had again presented himself as a candidate and, this time, was elected as Liberal representative for Elmwood with an overwhelming majority.

The 15th Legislative Assembly was one of impressive achievements. It was this government which brought about the enfranchisement of women (January 28, 1916) and amended the Municipal Boundaries Act. Because of the strict liquor laws, there had been a strong reaction towards drugs. A new Pharmaceutical Act sought to curtail the sale of cocaine and morphine and to confine it to doctors' prescriptions. Women became eligible for civic offices (March 8, 1917), the Mothers' Allowance Act was passed (March 10, 1917), the Election Act was amended and Proportional Representation introduced. The Public Health, Charity Aid, Workmen's Compensation, Public School and Prison Reform Acts were passed. Legislation with respect to conservation of natural resources was also effected and Widows' Pensions introduced. It was this Legislative Assembly which saw the completion of Manitoba's beautiful Parliament Building.

On scanning the Manitoba section of the Canadian Parliamentary Guide 1916 "Sketches of Members", it becomes plain that few, if any, members of the 15th Legislative Assembly entered the Legislature with such a proven record of community action as Dr. Hamilton. His impressive services in that Assembly included participation on several Select Standing Committees including Privileges and Elections, Law Amendments, Private Bills, Public Accounts, Printing and the Library. He chaired a number of these committees.

Dr. Hamilton was responsible for piloting the amendment to the Manitoba Medical College Act (which made the Medical College a part of the University of Manitoba) through the Assembly. He gave full support to the amendment to the Municipal Boundaries Act despite the fact that his own riding of Elmwood would be eliminated. That the Mothers' Allowance, Public School and Pharmaceutical Acts were given positive support in the Legislature was due, in part, to his persuasive and informed endorsement. It was also during a session of this Legislature that Dr. Hamilton expressed the opinion that, in the interests of public safety, annual re-licensing of all those connected with the health sciences should be mandatory.

The 15th Legislature was dissolved on March 27, 1920. As the riding of Elmwood had been eliminated and a portion of it was now part of Winnipeg, Dr. Hamilton, along with forty other candidates, sought one of the ten seats of the House now reserved for the city of Winnipeg. Although Dr. Hamilton made a strong showing, a heavy labour vote and his split riding proved too formidable. He was not re-elected.

These concerns, however, were secondary to his main calling--that of physician and surgeon. Although this collection does not emphasize his medical career, other records show that it was one of solid achievement. From 1911 to 1934, he was a member of the Winnipeg General Hospital Medical Staff. In 1919 the Board of Trustees of the Winnipeg General Hospital appointed him Assistant Surgeon (Outdoor) on the Honourary Attending Medical Staff of the hospital. All those who accepted such appointments incurred, as a condition of appointment, the responsibility to teach in connection with the medical school. Dr. Hamilton taught medical jurisprudence and acted also as examiner in Clinical Surgery.

The busy practitioners who formed the (Outdoor) Attending Medical Staff agreed to accept the further obligation of attending a Clinical Lunch on the first and third Thursdays of each month. One half hour was given over for lunch and a full hour devoted to clinical cases and discussion. The agenda of those luncheons show that Dr. Hamilton regularly addressed the group on surgical cases involving various forms of cancer, orthopaedic and skin graft problems. These talks, as well as published articles, indicate an uncommon measure of success in maintaining the mobility of injured points. The records of annual meetings of the Winnipeg General Hospital Board indicate his deep concern for a high level of service. His constant plea was for more effective co-operation between all levels of hospital personnel. These same records show him working shoulder to shoulder with men whose medical achievements were to gain them international recognition. It was a time that might well be called "the golden age" of the Winnipeg General Hospital when its Honourary Attending Staff included, not only Dr. Hamilton, but Dr. William Boyd (Pathology), Drs. Bruce and Gordon Chown (Rh Factor and Paediatrics), Drs. L.S. Goodman and A. Gilman (Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics) and Dr. Maxwell Wintrobe (Clinical Haematology).

Dr. Hamilton was an indefatigable worker. In 1921 he was elected President of the newly formed University of Manitoba Alumni Association and President of the Manitoba Medical Association. As well, he published the first edition of the Manitoba Medical Association Bulletin. In 1923 he was appointed one of Manitoba's two representatives to the Executive of the Canadian Medical Association--a position he held until 1931.

Considerable as these achievements were, it was his investigation of psychic phenomena that accounted for his international reputation. In 1918, his interest in the psychic had been aroused by his close friend Professor W.T. Allison (Professor of English at Wesley College), who had personally investigated the Patience Worth phenomena. Applying his usual scientific method of investigation, Dr. Hamilton familiarized himself with both the early and current literature of the subject. His later lectures and articles showed him to be thoroughly conversant with the work of Schrenk-Notzing, Geley, Osty, Myers, Podmore and Rhine. For a time his interest lay dormant. But, late in 1920, he began his own experiments which were to continue until April 1935. His aim was the investigation of paranormal phenomena (rappings, psychokinesis, ectoplasms and materializations) under scientific conditions that would rule out any possibility of fraud and minimize any possibility of error. Dr. Hamilton was particularly suited, both by training and by temperament, to conduct such investigations. While psychic phenomena have been known under one name or another in every recorded society, the questionable claims (some of which read like adventures in the absurd) of those who conducted their investigations under loose (if not fraudulent) experimental conditions, produced a scepticism on the part of many. There are few subjects which have aroused more bitter controversy. Dr. Hamilton, however, was interested in certain basic issues: 1) Do we have paranormal abilities, potentials for awareness and communication and action that we do not fully realize? 2) Can they be observed, measured and evaluated? 3) Are these abilities psychological or physical or both? 4) Do these capabilities continue to function after the experience of physical death? In other words, "Is there survival after death?"

Apparently, Dr. Hamilton was not primarily motivated by sentimental or religious beliefs. What he sought to obtain were verifiable facts culled from repeated experiments over a long period of time and conducted under rigorously controlled conditions. Full, accurate records of his experiments--many of them verbatim--were kept. An elaborate battery of cameras provided photographic records. He was well aware that many scientists refused to assign this subject a place for serious investigation. But, as one of his friends indicated, "He followed his own convictions, careless of criticism." In this, as in his other endeavours, he was interested in anything that might be beneficially applied to the human condition. Considering the present-day experimentation in extra-sensory perception, particularly in medical institutions, he may have been ahead of his time.

Nevertheless, there is no indication that his sincerity or integrity was ever in doubt. For himself, like Bagehot, he seems to have realized that "one of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea." Knowing this, he was able to accept such criticism as did come his way with a certain equanimity. In time, Dr. Hamilton's work became known in the United Kingdom, in Europe and in the United States. He was asked to speak before a wide variety of groups. From 1926 to 1935, he gave eighty-six lectures and wrote numerous articles that were published in Canada and abroad.

In his correspondence and in his other writings, Dr. Hamilton created his own portrait more accurately than either his family or friends could possibly have done. His writing transmits a warmth of personality and friendship. It is the records of an uncommon man who counted among his friends, in both Europe and America, many famous personalities of the 1920s and 1930s.

In 1933 he resigned from his staff and teaching positions due to ill health, although he continued to write on topics of interest to him. His last article, "Reality of Psychic Force", appeared in Light, Vol. 55, No. 2828 on Thursday, January 10, 1935. He died of a heart attack on April 7, 1935 at the age of sixty-one. The many tributes received by his family attest to the high regard in which he was held both by his medical colleagues and by his other numerous acquaintances. His wife Lillian carried on his paranormal experimentations following his death.

CHRONOLOGY OF IMPORTANT DATES

1873 -- Born November 27th to James and Isabella (Glendenning) Hamilton at Agincourt, Ontario

1903 -- Graduated from Manitoba Medical College

1904 -- Completed internship at Winnipeg General Hospital and commenced practice in Elmwood

1906 -- Married Lillian May Forrester, November 26th

1907 -- Elected to the Winnipeg Public School Board

1915 -- Served in the Manitoba Legislature

1920-1916 -- First Chairman of the Winnipeg Committee on Mothers' Pensions

John Elder Hart was born in Newstead, Scotland, on December 9, 1877. He became a mason's apprentice in 1903 and due to the demand for masons in Canada, John decided to emigrate there. Beginning in 1903, John made several trips back and forth between Canada and Scotland to visit with Janet Turnbull. They married in 1905 and finally settled in Winnipeg in that same year. John worked on various buildings including the church in Garson, Manitoba. John also worked at the Tyndall Quarry which was also in Manitoba. After demand for masons declined, John worked for the Canadian National Railway (CNR) until he retired at the age 65. He died on October 23, 1951. John and Janet had three daughters. The first daughter was Peggy (Dr. Margaret Elder Hart, 1907-2008), the second was Agnes Stewart Hart (1910-1990), and the third was Isobel Joan Borrowman (1917-2001). All three daughters attend the University of Manitoba where Margaret became a nursing instructor. Agnes became an economist for CNR and Isobel became a high school teacher in Ottawa.

Erdman Penner (1837-1907) and Maria (Van) Eitzen (1840-1900) arrived on the International, the first boat of Mennonite immigrants to southern Manitoba, on July 3, 1874. They came from the Chortitza village of the Bergthal colony in southern Russia. Erdman started a merchandise business and opened a rafting supplies store along the railway line that was passing through Gretna. He became mayor of Gretna in (). The family spent winters in Winnipeg. In 1874, their daughter Helena Penner was born.

In the 1880s, the family moved to Mountain Lake, Minnesota where Helena continued her schooling. Helena, or Helen as she was also known, attended the University of Manitoba and became the first Mennonite woman to graduate from this institution when she did so in 1899. Helen also organized the Modern Language Club (the University Women’s Club) at the University of Manitoba. She is also known as the author of “Granny stories” – a memoir of Mennonite life on the prairies. Helen married Gerhard Hiebert in 1902 and settled in Winnipeg. They had three daughters: Helen Elfriede (Di) Allen (1908-1982), Gerda Louise Riddoch (1910-1980), and Catherine Elizabeth Brown (1918-2013). Helen Hiebert passed away in 1970.

Helen's husband, Gerhard Hiebert (1868-1934), was a prominent Winnipeg surgeon who became chief surgeon at the Winnipeg General Hospital (1917-1919). Gerhard’s parents were also Mennonites from southern Russia who took the Kenilworth ship from Antwerp and arrived in New York on July 17, 1876. They came from Berjansk village near Chortitza village and settled in Mountain Lake, Minnesota.

Gerda Riddoch received the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire O.B.E. from the Queen of England in 1970.

Catherine Brown graduated from the University of Manitoba with a B.Sc. in 1938. She often travelled to England to visit her sister Elfriede (Di) and her husband John Frank Allen. Catherine was accepted by St. Thomas Hospital in England to study physiotherapy. During the Second World War she returned to Canada and married her husband, Edward C. Brown. Catherine and Edward had three children: Shirley, Peter, and Kenneth. In 2005 Catherine Brown established the Dr. Gerhard Hiebert Memorial Bursary Fund, in memory of her father, at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Manitoba.

Edward Brown’s grandfather was the Hon. Edward Brown, provincial treasurer of Manitoba (1915-1917). Edward’s father, Wallace E. Brown, was an original grain merchant for Richardson and Sons, Ltd. from the 1920s to 1960.

John and Wasyl (Bill) Hluschak were brothers who immigrated to Winnipeg from Ukraine as young men. Ella Hluschak (nee Kolytolo) was born in Winnipeg of immigrant parents. John and Ella met and married in Winnipeg. Eugene was their only child. John emigrated in the late 1920s and worked as a blacksmith in the Canadian Pacific Railway yards. He was also an extremely talented gunsmith and inventor. In his retirement years, he worked at Assiniboia Downs as a masseur for jockeys. Wasyl came later to Canada and established a tailor shop on Selkirk Avenue. His shop became a favorite gathering place for men in the neighborhood. In the 1940s, he contracted tuberculosis and spent several years in a sanatorium in the South-western United States. Ella developed her skills as a seamstress and sewed wedding dresses for a local dress shop. In later years, she became a dietary supervisor at the Victoria General Hospital. Eugene spent his formative years in the North end of Winnipeg. He went on to study history and anthropology at the University of Manitoba. Upon graduation, he was employed in the correctional system in Manitoba, and later in social work in Winnipeg, before embarking on a career in travel writing. His travels took him all over the world - South East Asia, Europe, United Kingdom, Africa, and the Caribbean. Wasyl died in the early 1970s, Ella in 1983, and John in 1989. Eugene met an early death at the age of 54 in 2004. The family set a remarkable example of hard work, ability and determination to succeed.

Walter (Volodymyr) Klymkiw was born in the village of Saranchuky, Ternopil’ province in what was then eastern Poland (now Ukraine) in 1926. Emigrating to Canada in 1928, he and his parents settled in Winnipeg. In 1950, he earned a B.A. in English and History at the University of British Columbia. He returned a year later to Winnipeg and received a teaching certificate from the University of Manitoba. In 1951, he began conducting the Ukrainian National Federation Choir (renamed the Olexander Koshetz Choir in 1967) of Winnipeg, under the guidance of Tetiana Koshetz and Pavlo Macenko. His love of Ukrainian music was fostered back in the mid-1940s, when he attended the Ukrainian Cultural and Educational Centre's Summer Music Courses conducted by the legendary Ukrainian Musicologist, Olexander Koshetz (Oleksander Koshyts'). In 1952, Klymkiw married Mary (Marusia) Kopychansky and had two sons: Myroslaw (Slawko) and Paul. Upon receiving his teaching certificate, Klymkiw began his career as a history teacher, in 1953, at Glenwood Junior High School in the St. Vital school division in Winnipeg. In 1961, he was appointed principal of Hastings Elementary and Junior High School, a position which he held until 1979. In 1979, he returned to Glenwood Junior High School where he served as its principal until 1983. In 1983, he was appointed music supervisor and served in this capacity until retiring later that year.

Retirement allowed Klymkiw to devote more time to being the choral director of the Olexander Koshetz Choir. During his nearly fifty years with the choir, Klymkiw and his choir toured throughout Canada, Ukraine, Poland, the Czech Republic, Western Europe, and South America. The choir went on to record two CDs, nine cassettes, and six records. For nearly half a century, he maintained and developed contacts with Ukraine's composers and artists. He fostered a special relationship with Anatoli Avdievsky (Anatolii Adiievs'kii), director of the world renowned Ver'ovka (Veriovka) Ukrainian State Folk Choir, a relationship which led to Ver'ovka's first Canadian tour in 1981. Besides his choir, Klymkiw and his wife devoted much of their time to various community activities including the Ukrainian National Federation (national and St. Boniface branch) and the Ukrainian Cultural and Educational Centre, Oseredok. They were involved in various commercial ventures including the Ukrainian House of Gifts, DK Attractions Ltd., and Canimplex Ltd. The latter two ventures involved bringing in various musical artists and groups from Ukraine to perform concerts for Canadian audiences. In recognition of his cultural achievements and contributions, Klymkiw received the Shevchenko Medal from the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, the Osvita Foundation Award, a Certificate of Merit from the federal Minister of Multiculturalism and Citizenship, and an honourary Doctor of Canon Law Degree from St. Andrew's College of the University of Manitoba. In 1992, Klymkiw and the Olexander Koshetz Choir were awarded the Taras Shevchenko Medal from the government of Ukraine, the first such honour given to an individual or group outside of the country. In 1999, the Olexander Koshetz Choir paid tribute to Klymkiw with an evening gala for his lifetime devotion to Ukrainian culture and music in Canada. They honoured him by establishing the Walter Klymkiw Endowment Fund at the University of Manitoba School of Music and Music Education. In December 2000, after a lengthy battle with cancer, Walter Klymkiw died at the age of seventy-four in Winnipeg.

John Duncan MacDonald and his wife, Anne, immigrated to Manitoba from Scotland in 1872. John McIntyre MacDonald was one of their nine children. John McIntyre homesteaded and over time, more land was bought around the original homestead, which was then passed on to his descendants. He married Sarah McMillan and they had three children. John Duncan was the second of the three and he married Margaret Greer. They had four children, the second being Robert James. Robert married Edna Thompson in 1948 and they had four children.

The Martynec family, although not entirely representative, was part of the post-World War II wave of Ukrainian refugees and displaced persons who settled in Canada.Volodymyr Martynec (1899-1960) was born into a Ukrainian middle class family in the city of Lviv (then also formally known as Lemberg [in German] or Lwów [in Polish]), Crownland of Galicia, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Ukraine). He was educated in the city’s primary and secondary schools and participated in the Ukrainian armed struggle for independence (1918-20) as a member of the (Ukrainian) Sich Riflemen. After the Great War he was active in the Ukrainian student movement while studying law at Lviv’s Ukrainian Underground University (1921-23), economics at the Higher Commercial School in Prague, Czechoslovakia (1923-26), political science and journalism in Berlin, Germany (1927-29), and philosophy at the Sorbonne, in Paris, France (1934-36). In 1927, he became one of the leaders of the underground Ukrainian Military Organization (UVO) and one of the founders of the militant and radical Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). In subsequent years, he served as a member of the OUN Leadership (Provid) and as editor of some of its most important ideological journals, including Surma (The Bugle; 1927-33), Rozbudova natsii (Building the Nation; 1928-1934) and the Parisian Ukrains’ke slovo (The Ukrainian Word; 1934-40). In 1941, Martynec and his family returned to German-occupied eastern Galicia or western Ukraine where he became one of the leaders of the OUN Melnyk faction (OUN[m]). In 1944 the Germans incarcerated Martynec at the Brätz (Brójce) Work / Re-Education (Arbeitserziehungslager) camp in western Poland. After the war, Martynec and his family spent time in the Displaced Persons’ Camps in Karlsfeld (1945-46) and Berchtesgaden (1946-48), Germany. In January 1949, the family left Germany and settled in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, where Martynec became one of the editors of the weekly Novyi shliakh (New Pathway; 1949-60), the official organ of the Ukrainian National Federation, a Ukrainian-Canadian mass organization ideologically aligned with the OUN(m). He also served on the presidium of the Ukrainian Canadian Committee. The author of 18 books and pamphlets, in particular Ukrains’ke pidpillia: vid UVO do OUN (The Ukrainian Underground: From the UVO to the OUN; 1949), and over 4,000 periodical and newspaper articles, Martynec died in Winnipeg in 1960.

Around 1930 Martynec married Irena Turkevycz (1899-1983), the daughter of a Ukrainian Greek Catholic priest, catechist, choir conductor, and music critic. Born in the town of Brody, she grew up and was educated in Lviv and in Vienna. Her education included music lessons (voice, piano, theory) from a very early age, and featured private instruction by the composer Stanyslav Liudkevych. During the 1920s Irena studied music and acting at the Lviv Conservatory and drama school, made her debut as a concert soloist, and also performed on the stage of the Lviv Theatre of Opera and Ballet. During the early 1930s she studied voice at the Berlin University of the Arts, and in Prague, where she sang with the Prague Opera. Between 1942 and 1944, when the family resided in Lviv, she sang a number of major roles with the Lviv Theatre of Opera and Ballet. She continued to participate actively in Ukrainian opera and theatre productions in Karlsfeld, Karlsbad and Berchtesgaden, Germany, during the immediate post-war years. After emigrating to Canada in 1949, Irena Turkevycz-Martynec was particularly active with youth and children’s groups, staging and directing very successful and memorable productions of Mykola Lysenko’s children’s operetta Koza-Dereza (in the early 1950s and then again in 1964), and Zymova kralia (The Snow Queen) in 1965. In 1967, her troupe of youthful singers performed Koza-Dereza at Expo 67. She passed away in Winnipeg in 1983.

Lew Martynec (1934-2018), the only child of Volodymyr Martynec and Irena Turkevycz-Martynec, was born in Paris, France, where he spent the first seven years of his life and started his primary education. He accompanied his parents when they returned to western Ukraine in 1941 and spent his teenage years in the Displaced Person’s camps in Karlsfeld and Berchtesgaden, Germany. He completed his high school education in Winnipeg and studied engineering at the University of Manitoba (but apparently did not graduate). He worked for the City of St. Boniface and the City of Winnipeg as a department manager responsible for approving street construction plans. An avid outdoorsman, he passed away in 2018.Stephania Luchynska-Pohorecky (“Doda”) (1923-2015), an only child and an orphan, was the niece of Irena Turkevycz-Martynec. She joined the Martynec family in Lviv around 1943 and stayed with the family as they migrated from western Ukraine to the Displaced Person’s camps in Karlsfeld and Berchtesgaden, Germany, and then on to Winnipeg. In Winnipeg she met and later married Zenon Pohorecky (the son of “Novyi shliakh/New Pathway” founder and co-editor Michael Pohorecky), an anthropologist who completed his PhD at the University of California (Berkeley) and taught for many years at the University of Saskatchewan.

The fonds also contain several photographs of Stefania Turkewicz-Lukianowicz (1898-1977), older sister of Irena Turkevycz-Martynec, a composer, pianist and musicologist, educated in Lviv and Prague, who immigrated to the United Kingdom after WWII.

Stefan Sytnyk, 1897 – 1989 . Stefan Sytnyk was born in Ternopil, Crownland of Galicia, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Ukraine) in 1897, one of five children. He worked as a skilled tradesman in his early years, and drove trains during the First World War. In 1926, he immigrated to Canada, followed by his wife Eugenia one year later; together they settled in Winnipeg where they would live for the rest of their lives. At first, Stefan worked for the railroad, but he had an entrepreneurial bent so after a few years, he and his wife, assisted by their only child Irene, opened a grocery store in Winnipeg’s North End which they operated until the early 1940’s. Supported by this business, Stefan began acquiring what became an extensive collection of rental properties throughout Winnipeg which he determinedly maintained himself even well into his eighties! Through his lifetime of hard work and frugal living, Stefan supported his wife’s extensive activities in the Ukrainian community and built a foundation for the future financial security and success of his family.

Eugenia Sytnyk, 1900 ? – 1975 . Eugenia Sytnyk was born in Ternopil, Crownland of Galicia, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Ukraine). She became interested in community work very early in life, organizing women’s groups, cooperatives and schools, and serving with the Red Cross during the First World War She followed her husband Stefan to Canada in 1927, settling with him in Winnipeg where they had their only child Irene one year later. Eugenia continued her involvement in community work, teaching school, editing women’s and children’s pages of Ukrainian newspapers and helping Ukrainian immigrants adapt to life in Canada. She became a founding member of the Ukrainian Women’s League as well as of the Ukrainian Women’s Organization of Canada (UWOC) and also took on executive positions with a wide variety of local and national Ukrainian organizations, including the Ukrainian Canadian Women’s Committee and the World Federation of Ukrainian Women’s Organizations. Eugenia was recognized for her many years of service to the Ukrainian community with the Shevchenko Medal for Meritorious Service at the ninth Congress of Ukrainians in Canada, and the City of Winnipeg Community Service Award medal.

John Melnyk Sr., 1916 – 2009. John Melnyk was the elder son of Mykola and Palagia who immigrated to Canada from Ukraine and met and married in Winnipeg. From an early age, John was drawn to the piano, studying it enthusiastically from 1924 to 1938, first with Maria Kekishiwna (a pupil of Anton Rubinstein), Leda Omansky, and finally Beryl Ferguson under whose tutelage he earned his Licentiate of the Royal Schools of Music, London in 1935. He became a well-known performer in Winnipeg, participating in the Saturday Night concert series sponsored by the Men's Music Club of Winnipeg, performing live-to-air broadcasts for CBC, touring Western Canada with up-and-coming Canadian musicians, and accompanying touring international artists on their Canadian appearances. He also composed three preludes, a sonata, a concerto, and two sets of variations, all for piano and all unpublished. In later life he settled into teaching which he continued well into his eighties. Twenty-four of his students won the Aikins Memorial Trophy as top instrumentalist in the Manitoba Music Festival, with which he was associated for over 70 years. That festival now annually awards the John Melnyk trophy and bursary for the best performance of a piano concerto.

Irene Melnyk, 1928 – 2012 . Irene was the only child of Ukrainian immigrants Stefan and Eugenia Sytnyk. She grew up helping her parents in their store, accompanying her mother to community meetings, participating in Ukrainian groups and taking piano lessons from John Melnyk whom she married in 1948. Irene was then attending the University of Manitoba from which she received a Bachelor of Science in 1950. Shortly thereafter her two sons were born, and she devoted herself wholeheartedly to raising them, yet still found time to teach Ukrainian and Sunday school, publish two Ukrainian primers with her friend Nadia Pip, as well as teach piano in her husband’s burgeoning studio and publish a scale book for beginners with him. As her sons grew older, Irene turned her energies and love of learning to holistic health. She opened a health food store under the Shaklee organization, studied extensively at the Moreau Institute of Natural Healing, and also earned credentials in Physical Health, Natural Nutritional Sciences and Natural Therapeutics among others. She became a respected reflexologist and teacher, serving on the Reflexology Association of Canada (RAC) board of directors for several years; RAC awarded her a lifetime membership in 1997 and recognized her as Outstanding Teacher of the Year in 2006.

The Michalchyshyn family is one of many Ukrainian pioneer families who have shaped the history of Ukrainians in Manitoba. Walter Michalchyshyn was born on June 24, 1909 in Byczkiwci (Chortkiw), Crownland of Galicia, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Ukraine). In 1923, he came with his parents, George (Yurii) and Kateryna Michalchyshyn to Canada, and settled in Portage la Prairie. His parents were deeply religious and were very active in the Ukrainian Catholic Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Portage la Prairie. They inspired their children and Walter followed his father’s footsteps, and became a cantor in Ukrainian Catholic churches.

In 1935 Walter married Catherine Kuzyk and worked as a baker in Brandon. Catherine was a devoted member of the Ukrainian Catholic Women’s League and other Ukrainian women’s organization. In 1948, the couple bought a bakery in Shoal Lake and worked there until 1959. When they moved to Winnipeg, Walter got a position as a supervisor at the Donut House. Walter was a member of the Parish Council of St. Joseph’s Ukrainian Catholic Church, and the St. Nicholas Mutual Benefit Association. Walter and Catherine Michalchyshyn had five children: Irene (Gajecky), Stella (Hryniuk), Joseph, Ivan, and Ray. They are all educated professionals who followed their parents’ example in their love for Ukrainian culture and history. Catherine Michalchyshyn died on October 8, 2009 predeceased by Walter Michalchyshyn, who died on September 1, 2000

Larry Morrissette was largely involved in organizations committed to Aboriginal wellness. Some of these included the Native Alcohol Foundation of Manitoba, the Aboriginal Council of Winnipeg, the Native Education Advisory Committee for Winnipeg School Division #1, the Thunder Eagle Society, the Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre, and the Aboriginal Youth Renovations Project. Morrissette also spent time as a part-time lecturer for the Faculty of Social Work Aboriginal Focus Program, teaching in the Inner-City Social Work Program at the University of Manitoba and the Department of Urban and Inner-City Studies at the University of Winnipeg. Many of Morrissette’s activities, volunteer and otherwise, have involved him in the revitalization of Indigenous culture and the promotion of Aboriginal youth, including his founding of the Medicine Fire Lodge Inc., his directorship of an organization that works with Aboriginal street gang members called Ogijiita Pimatiswin Kinamatwin, and his skills as a Sun Dancer.

Vern Morrissette has been involved in many of the same organizations as his brother, also guest lecturing at the University of Manitoba and the University of Winnipeg Faculties of Social Work and holding an Aboriginal Perspectives position for the Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre Inc. Morrissette has also contributed as a part of the International Institute for Sustainable Development.

The O’Hare family was a prominent Manitoban family. John O’Hare, born on July 1 1876, was the son of Peter O’Hare and Sarah Ann O’Hare. Sara Ann later remarried Henry Lawrence and changed her name to Sarah Ann Lawrence. John O’Hare married Florence Frances Bridger (daughter of Thomas and Sara Bridger) in 1901, they had three children: Ralph, Elva, and Zella Mae. Elva graduated from the University of Manitoba in 1928 with a degree in Varsity Arts. Zella Mae married Bill Webber. Bill Webber served in WWII in the Canadian Navy as a member of the Fleet Air Arm. He also managed the Winnipeg Monarchs to two Canadian junior Hockey Memorial Cup National Championships in 1935 and 1937.